An extension of the Common Sense Journalism monthly column by Doug Fisher, former broadcaster, newspaper reporter and wire service editor. From new media to old, much of journalism is just plain common sense."In matters of style, swim with the current; in matters of principle, stand like a rock." - Unknown (often improperly attributed to Thomas Jefferson)
"It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends upon his not understanding it." - Upton Sinclair
"Common sense is not so common" - Voltaire
"Common sense is instinct; enough of it is genius" - George Bernard Shaw

Wednesday, August 07, 2013

August column: Why we must write more concisely

Here is this month's column sent to press associations around the country:

Why we must write
more concisely

It's almost
impossible to go a day without new statistics illustrating how our audience is
quickly shifting to mobile devices.

The Census
Bureau says almost half the U.S. population 15 and older has a smartphone. The
Pew Research Center puts it even higher, 56 percent. A significant number say
they use their phone as the main way to get online.

But we still do
too much writing as if the reader will lean back with "the paper" in
an easy chair. We have to change. Even our "print" writing will
benefit.

People using
mobile devices consume information in short bursts as time allows. They aren't
thrilled with ledes and paragraphs that sprawl over two or three small screens.

Raju Narisetti,
a former reporter who oversaw digital strategy at both The Wall Street Journal
and The Washington Post, recalls a Post story on corruption in Alaska. It had
the great anecdotal lead, solid nut graf, great detail. Only it took seven
smartphone screens to get to the nut and 46 to finish.

"You have
to start pivoting from creating just content to creating a great experience and
creating different experiences on different devices. And it's hard," he
told the Nieman Journalism Lab.

But it often
can mean just sharpening a lead's focus, like this one:

A Colorado man who may be linked to the
slaying of Colorado's state prison chief died from gunshot wounds received in a
shootout with Texas police, law enforcement officials said Friday.

Most people
will correctly conclude that a shootout means he was shot. And the story
quickly explains he was shot by police. So tighten it from 31 to 25 words:

A Colorado man possibly linked to the
slaying of that state's prison chief died after a shootout with Texas police,
law enforcement officials said Friday.

Sometimes we
can't shorten that much, but we can bring the focus firmly atop that first
screen:

New public documents reveal that government
concerns over the potential of a catastrophic failure of the Jocassee Dam
flooding the Oconee Nuclear Station downstream stretch back more than three decades.

I think the
point for most people will be that it's been more than 30 years (why the
journalese "three decades"). And we can drop "downstream,"
taking 30 words to 26:

For more than 30 years, government officials
have feared catastrophic failure of the Jocassee Dam could flood the Oconee
Nuclear Station, according to newly released documents.

The next
paragraph illustrates how we're also prone to pile clauses and thoughts into
one sentence. Let's use the period more. Not only does it give readers a
breather, it also allows some "responsive" Web designs to break the
graf, depending on the screen size:

The documents – once held back for security
reasons but released recently by the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission under
the Freedom of Information Act – also illustrate a protracted and jagged path
to nuclear regulators' demands today that the station's owner, Duke Energy, do
more to protect against the threat.

Slightly reworked,
with the focus again moved to the top:

The documents show a protracted and jagged
path to current regulators' demands that Oconee's owner, Duke Energy, do more
to protect against the threat. They had been withheld for security reasons but
were released recently by the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission under the
Freedom of Information Act.

You can
probably find numerous examples in your paper and on your website. If you want
an idea of how things will look on a small screen, you can use online tools
like responsinator.com or quirktools.com/screenfly.

Those who say
long-form is dead forget the Internet can deliver those narratives to customers
willing to pay for them just as easily as it can deliver mobile-focused
formats. But we probably will end up having to write multiple versions. Sadly,
it comes at a time when editors, who would be the ones to add value doing this,
are being cut.

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About Me

Yes, I do coaching and consulting. That is the only shameless commerce you'll get from me here. Go to the bottom of the blog for more details.
Who am I: A longtime print and broadcast reporter/editor/producer and then AP news editor who now professes journalism at the University of South Carolina. (But please note, nothing on this blog represents official university policy or sentiment. If it did, I'd be very concerned.)My point: That journalism is a great occupation, that most journalism is common sense and that our problems arise when we sometimes don't use it.What's covered: My interests center on editing and writing and on editors and the challenges they face in a changing environment. I'm convinced editors are not being trained enough to face these challenges, but that common sense rules the day. I'm heavily involved in Newsplex, the new-media newsroom at the University of South Carolina. But my interests are wide-ranging, so anything, from ethics to some aspects of Web design, is fair game.
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Common Sense Journalism &nbspYes, I do seminars and consulting. Among those I have worked with are the SNPA Traveling Campus, S.C. Press Association, N.Y. Press Association, Georgia Press Association, Mississippi Press Association, Virginia Press Association, Landmark Community Newspapers, American Copy Editors Society, Society of Professional Journalists, Lancaster (S.C.) News, The (Rock Hill, S.C.) Herald, The (Sumter, S.C.) Item, the Internal Revenue Service and the Social Security Administration. Contact me for more information.